


Orange is the color of your eyes when you're angry at me (I'm guessing here, I can't see through your mask)

by Kartaylir



Category: Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic (Video Game)
Genre: Extra Treat, Graphic Depictions of Hand Kissing, M/M, Trapped in Spaceship Escape Pod Together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-07
Updated: 2019-10-07
Packaged: 2020-12-01 23:08:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20928857
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kartaylir/pseuds/Kartaylir
Summary: Theron Shan makes sure Darth Marr doesn't go down with his flagship. They've a little time to themselves before Zakuul.





	Orange is the color of your eyes when you're angry at me (I'm guessing here, I can't see through your mask)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [wednesday](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wednesday/gifts).

"I see you've inherited your mother's lack of sense, Agent Shan," was the first thing Darth Marr said once he'd coughed himself awake. The weak lights of their escape pod cast shadows into every direction, exaggerated the spikes set on his shoulders into something even more looming.

"Says the man who tried to go down with his flagship." Theron Shan crossed his arms and then pointedly looked away from Marr. Out the narrow window at the unfamiliar patterns of so many stars.

Some of which were now hidden between the strange, narrow outlines of the vessels that had ambushed them. Each bore tall spires, extensive gun mounts, and not nearly enough space within their forms for an extensive complement of crew. The latter would have made Theron wonder more if they hadn't just been attacked by forces comprised mostly of droids. 

He leaned against the wall of the escape pod, its metal feeling sturdy and yet all too thin against the space that surrounded them. A drop of sweat pooled atop the implants in his brow and then slowly dripped down past Theron's eye. He found himself with an impression of heat, of Marr scowling beneath his mask.

And when Marr spoke again the escape pod seemed to rumble beneath the weight of his voice. "It would have been of more use than my presence here with you. Be glad I did not refuse until you went down with me."

"Not the thanks I imagined there. Not like I'm that sweaty."

Darth Marr did not move, but his shadow seemed to have edged closer. "Did you have something in mind, Agent Shan?"

"I, umm...." Theron, for once, thought better of finishing that sentence. Instead he lifted his shoulder and tilted his head in an attempt to discreetly check just how sweaty he was. The pods were supposed to be cold, after all. And on a scale of Rishi beach to that one time he'd spent days in the sweltering engine room of an experimental Sith warship he wasn't doing too bad. "What are some non-death ways of thanking people?"

"Our enemies surround us. This is no more the time for such questions than it would be for you to ask for the removal of my armor."

It was indeed hardly the time to ask, a fact emphasized by ships still floating around them.

"Not big on gratitude then?" Theron asked.

Marr stretched out his hand, the black glove nearly extended to Theron's shoulder. "You can manage at least some semblance of respect."

And so Theron knelt. Looked down to the floor, the once-shining surface of its metal dusted with ash from the flagship's wreckage.

Then cast all somberness from his expression as he lifted his head and grinned. Marr's hand did not move.

Maybe that was why Theron leaned over just far enough to kiss it. The leather of the glove kept him from feeling the skin beneath, but he imagined Darth Marr's palm to be rough and worn from battle. Calloused in the particular patterns wielding a lightsaber could cause.

Marr, for his part, did not move. No twitch of his fingers to crush Theron's throat, no hum of his lightsaber to cut Theron's head from his shoulders.

Theron let his lips drift down the leather until they reached Marr's fingertips. Like the floor, these were coated with dust and ash to dull them.

Just enough of it that Theron coughed at the taste.

"I suppose I can spare the glove," Darth Marr said. It slid from his hand with a greater delicacy of the Force then Theron had expected from such a warrior of the Sith. 

But, Theron's other expectation proved accurate. The now-exposed hand was calloused and worn, dotted with tiny scars from endless battles. Swirls of dark side corruption had worked their way through near every bit of visible skin, as if it had been filled with the darkest of ink. And yet he still felt only the warmth of flesh beneath his lips. He closed his eyes and let his tongue linger on the stretch of skin between thumb and forefinger, then moved again toward the center of Marr's palm. Froze as his lips reached a ridge, a circle of once-burned scarring. The space within it was warm as fire, as if held together by the power of Marr's will. All that had made him of the bulwark of the Empire.

It was almost enough to make Theron reconsider his decisions. Almost, but enough that he hesitated.

Then Marr, _Darth Marr_, closed his hand over Theron's mouth. Theron gasped, jaw and cheekbone wedged in place by the strength of that grip. But it left him room to breathe.

"I did not tell you to stop," Marr said, and Theron's bones reverberated with the weight of those words.

With his mouth held it was easy to place more kisses at the bases of Marr's fingers, to map the indents of lines and scars. Despite the heat of the pod, despite his armor, Marr's hand felt dry save for the brief traces of Theron's lips. 

He did not meet the eyes of the Sith Lord, did not look to wherever they might have been beneath that mask. It was just the slight taste of salt on skin, and his sense of wonder at how Marr had known. How long Marr might have known.

_Long enough to know you're an idiot_, Theron thought to himself. He felt a sudden desire to blame oxygen deprivation for this, or to pretend that he'd hit his head while evacuating the flagship. Or something cleverer that he very much hadn't thought of yet.

Presuming they survived long enough that he had to explain it. With his luck they were liable to get eaten by Sith-spawned space worms. Or, under the circumstances, giant space droid worms.

It was better not to let himself linger on that. There was no shortage of other questions he could ask.

"What'd you have done if I'd tried this on Yavin IV?" Theron said, the words mumbled through the pressure of Marr's hand.

The metal that surrounded them wailed, twisted inward. Marr flicked his hand and pulled away from Theron's lips. The glove slid back into its place.

"It seems our enemies grow impatient," Marr said. His lightsaber burst into crimson light in his hand. "Prepare yourself."

The weapon's glow was all that Theron could focus on as the walls of their escape pod bled together, white and grey evaporated against the darkness of space. The orange of heated metal as Marr sliced the first droid in half. Maybe his mask would protect him, but Theron found his own dizziness explained as he saw some fog swirling across the floor.

Whoever commanded these droids wanted them alive.

And then Theron fell, unconscious, to the floor. He did not know where he'd awaken.


End file.
